I don’t say this about every politician, but I have no doubt that Jimmy Carter was welcomed home to heaven. The first thing I thought when I heard he had died, was “I’m glad for him.”
I think he went straight into the light and love that is God. I think he heard the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
Jimmy Carter did many good things during his long life. His Camp David Accord achieved the only lasting peace that anyone has put together in the Middle East. He made sure that children received the vaccinations that have saved so many lives.
His work after he left office, from his foundation work to advance democracy and human rights around the globe, to his shining example of personal involvement in the hard work of doing for others with things like Habitat for Humanity, all testify to a life of lived faith in Christ.
Jimmy Carter was a Christian who walked the walk. His long marriage to his one wife, his well-brought-up family, his deep commitment to caring about the least of these and standing up for the oppressed, were a testimony of faith in action. Instead of getting rich and living large, he did good for others. His life was a living monument to the good that former presidents can achieve.
I wasn’t surprised, considering what the Republican Party has devolved down to, that certain former and current Republican elected officials reacted to President Carter’s death with their usual jeering trashiness. These bitter, hate-filled people don’t try to hide what they are, not even on occasions like this.
I’m not going to go into a denunciation of these people. We shouldn’t tolerate this from those we put in office. If you don’t understand that, there’s something lacking in you. We’ve become too degraded as human beings to know that this is not decent and it’s not acceptable.
What I want to say instead is simply that these slurs against Jimmy Carter when he died did not hurt him. He was in heaven and all this stuff here in this world was gone from him.
That’s because when we die, we take nothing with us. Jimmy Carter was a graduate of the Naval Academy, who held a degree in nuclear physics. He was Governor of Georgia and President of the United States. He won the Nobel Prize and authored the only lasting peace agreement in the Middle East. He devoted decades of his life to furthering democracy and human rights around the globe.
But none of that went with him when he died. He left it all behind, and I would guess, it was forgotten. Achievements, wealth, fame, count for nothing on the other side.
St Paul said, “Faith, hope, love; these three endure.”
That’s it. That’s the treasure we lay up for our eternity. When Jimmy Carter left, the Nobel Prize, the degree in nuclear physics, the presidency and the foundation he began all stayed here.
His personal life was irreproachable; an example of how practicing Christians live. I’ve heard him discuss the fact that he and his wife read the Bible and prayed together every night before bed. He taught Sunday school in his local church until he was close to 100 years old.
But the only parts of that he took with him was the love that inspired him, the faith that led him, and the hope in Christ that upheld him.
I believe that Jimmy Carter is in heaven because I believe he was a man who loved much, who had great faith in God and whose actions in this life were built on his followership of Jesus Christ.
The slurs from these tawdry Republican performance haters did no harm to Jimmy Carter at all. Jimmy Carter has finished his race and won his crown.
The persons these people harmed with their behavior were themselves first of all, and the rest of us secondly.
Their behavior in this and many other matters is another living testament. Unlike the testament of Jimmy Carter’s well-lived life, theirs is almost a deliberate proclamation that the god they follow is not Jesus Christ.
These constant calls to hate this or that person or group of people; this mockery, and slandering, lying and cheating — this outright and open corruption, bribery and boasting — are all clear indicators of people whose god is something and someone who is opposite in every way from Christ the Lord.
These poor, sad, trivial people who are constantly dumping this tsunami of verbal sewage onto the rest of us are destroying their own souls. The fact that so many of them are stridently self-righteous and arrogantly proclaim that they are Christians does not make them followers of the Carpenter from Nazareth.
They are not following God. They are mocking God. And they are going to end up going to hell. When they come to the end of their lives, as Jimmy Carter has come to the end of his, they, like him, will take nothing with them except their faith, hope and love.
I think this means that most of them will leave empty-handed. They are not following Christ. They are following a nasty cult of hate, destruction and greed. They have no love that I can see. The only thing they ever show the world is their hate. Their faith is faith in the power to bully, control, and destroy other people. Their god is their greed and vaunting self-love.
The people who attacked Jimmy Carter after he died didn’t hurt Jimmy Carter. But they inflicted real wounds on their own souls. And they led many silly and foolish people into the same sort of cheap calumny. They are leading people away from Christ and into the worship of another, evil, god.
I’m not going to waste a lot of time telling people they should be appalled by the behavior of these bad individuals. I know because I have witnessed it, that many millions of people in this country are addicted to hatred. They relish the slander. They get off on the cruelty. That’s why they follow these haters.
All I will say is that if that’s you; if you are addicted to this malicious evil and enjoy it, then you should know that the still small voice that urges you to listen to this evil and follow it is not the Holy Spirit.
It doesn’t matter if you go to church and proclaim yourself a Christian. If you follow the devil throughout your days and never repent, you are his.
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